Wisconsin state Rep. Dan Knodl (R) won Tuesday’s special election for an open state Senate seat, handing Republicans a supermajority in the upper chamber and the necessary votes to impeach state officials.
Knodl defeated Democratic attorney Jodi Habush Sinykin by just under 2 points in the race to represent Milwaukee’s northern suburbs, according to The Associated Press.
“This campaign has always been about focusing on the issues, like rising prices, crime, and education, and I am incredibly grateful to the voters of the 8th Senate District for placing their trust in me to represent them in the Wisconsin State Senate,” Knodl said in a Facebook post early Wednesday morning.
“Whether you voted for me or my opponent, I intend to resolutely and faithfully represent all of my constituents,” he added. “Now that the election has been decided, it’s time to get to work for the people of the 8th Senate District and the people of Wisconsin.”
The Republican candidate’s win coincided with that of Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge Janet Protasiewicz in the state’s high-profile Supreme Court race, giving the bench a liberal tilt for the first time in 15 years.
The newly constituted liberal majority may have the opportunity to rule on legal challenges to the Wisconsin’s legislative maps, as well as the state’s hotly contested 1849 abortion ban.
However, Knodl said last month that he “certainly would consider” supporting efforts to impeach Protasiewicz.
“The judges, the circuit court judges, I think, have failed the community by releasing or not having a high enough bail on these criminals, the perpetrators. And so, they need to be looked at. And Janet Protasiewicz is a circuit court judge right now in Milwaukee, and she has failed,” he said in an interview on WISN’s “Upfront.” Snow on the beach: Florida deputies say $100,000 in cocaine washed ashore White House addressing antisemitism at the start of Passover; opportunity for all faiths to combat hate
Knodl was one of several dozen state lawmakers who signed onto a letter in 2020 calling for Vice President Pence to reject the certification of the election on Jan. 6, 2021.
In a recent interview with Wisconsin Public Radio, Knodl claimed there were “abnormalities” in the 2020 election but emphasized that he does not deny the outcome of the election.
Democrats attempted unsuccessfully to meddle in the Republican primary for the special election, boosting Knodl’s far-right opponent state Rep. Janel Brandtjen, according to The New York Times. However, Knodl ultimately defeated Brandtjen by about 25 points in the February primary.
CHICAGO — At 27, Luis Robert Jr. is already a relic of sorts, the last remaining player from the White Sox’s all-too-brief era of contention.
On the south side of Chicago, that era seems like a very long time ago. That’s how a pair of 100-loss seasons, including last year’s record-setting 121-loss campaign, can warp a baseball fan’s perception of time. In fact, it was only 3½ years ago when, on Oct. 12, 2021, Chicago was eliminated by the Houston Astros from the American League Division Series.
Seventeen players appeared in that game for the White Sox. Robert had a hit that day but had to leave early with leg tightness — one of a string of maladies that have bedeviled his career. He is the only one of those 17 still in Chicago.
The irony: If Robert was playing up to his potential, he wouldn’t be around, either. And if he regains his mojo, he’s as good as gone.
Robert has the chance to be the most sought-after position player in 2025’s in-season trade market. Pull up any speculative list of trade candidates and Robert is near the top. Executives around the league ask about him eagerly. Despite a lack of positive recent results — including a disastrous 2024 and a rough start to this season — it’s not hard to understand why.
“A player like Luis Robert always gets a lot of attention,” White Sox GM Chris Getz said when the season began. “We’re really happy where he’s at, and how he approached spring training and how he’s performing. We expect him to perform at a very high level.”
Robert’s tools are impossible to miss. His bat speed (93rd percentile in 2025, per Statcast) is elite. His career slugging percentage when putting the ball in play is .661, slotting him in the 89th percentile among all hitters. It’s the same figure as New York Mets superstar Juan Soto. Robert’s sprint speed (29.0 feet per second) is in the 94th percentile. When healthy, he’s a perennial contender to add a second Gold Glove to the one he won as a rookie.
Still, the allure of Robert is as much about his contract as it is about his baseline talent. Smack in his prime and less than two years removed from a 5.3 bWAR season, Robert will earn just $15 million in 2025 and then has two team-friendly club options, both at $20 million with a $2 million buyout.
No potentially available hitter has this combination: a recent record of elite production, a right-now prime age, top-of-the-charts underlying talent and a club-friendly contract with multiyear potential but plenty of off-ramps. That such a player toils for a team projected to finish in the basement has for a while now made this a matter of if, not when, he is moved.
“I didn’t think I’d be here,” Robert said through an interpreter. “But I’m glad that I’m here. This is the organization that made my dream come true. It’s the only organization that I know.”
The White Sox could certainly have dealt Robert by now, based on that contract/talent combination alone. But the luxury of the contract from Chicago’s standpoint is that it buys the team time to seek maximum return. First, Robert has to show he’s healthy — so far, so good in 2025 — then he needs to demonstrate the kind of production that would make an impact for a team in win-now mode.
“He’s just extremely talented,” first-year White Sox manager Will Venable said. “The one thing that I learned about him, and watching him practice every day, is he practices extremely hard. He’s extremely focused. He certainly has the physical ability, but he’s the type of player he is because he works really hard.”
Certainly, the skills are elite, but the production has been inconsistent and, for now, headed in the wrong direction.
When Robert broke in with Chicago a few years ago, he was a consensus top-five prospect. ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel ranked Robert fifth before the 2020 season, but in his analysis of the ranking, McDaniel noted one of the key reasons Robert is still on the White Sox five years later: “The concern is that Robert’s pitch selection is weak enough — described as a 35 on the 20-80 scale — that it could undermine his offensive tools.”
Since the beginning of last season, there have been 202 hitters with at least 450 plate appearances. According to the FanGraphs metric wRC+, only 15 have fared worse than Roberts’ 80. Only 10 have posted a worse ratio of walks to strikeouts (0.22). Only nine have a lower on-base percentage (.275).
Despite starting the season healthy, his superficial numbers during the early going are even worse than last year. As the team around him plunged to historic depths, Robert slashed to career lows across the board (.224/.278/.379 over 100 games). This year, that line is a disturbing .163/.250/.245.
There is real evidence that Robert is trying to reform. The most obvious evidence is a walk rate (10.3%) nearly double his career average. The sample is small, but there are under-the-hood indicators that suggest it could be meaningful. For example, Robert’s early chase rate (34.2%, per Statcast) is a career low and closer to the MLB standard (28.5).
For aggressive swingers well into their careers, trying to master plate discipline is a tall task. Few established players of that ilk have had a longer road to travel than Robert. During the wild-card era, there have been 1,135 players who have compiled at least 1,500 plate appearances. Only 17 have a lower walk-to-strikeout ratio than Robert’s career figure (0.21).
On that list are 133 hitters with a career mark of 0.3 W/SO or lower, who together account for 645 different seasons of at least 300 plate appearances. Only 26 times did one of those seasons result in at least a league-average ratio, or about 4%. Only one of those hitters had two such seasons, another 24 did it once and 108 never did it.
Still, 4% isn’t zero. To that end, Robert spent time during the winter working out with baseball’s current leader in W/SO — Soto.
“It’s no secret that one of the reasons why he’s one of the best players in the game is that he’s quite disciplined,” Robert said. “And that’s one of the things I want to improve.”
That’s easier said than done, and for his part, Soto said the workouts were mostly just that — workouts, though they were conducted with Robert’s hitting coach on hand. As with everyone else, it’s the sheer talent that exudes from Robert that caught Soto’s eye.
“Tremendous baseball player and tremendous athlete,” Soto told ESPN’s Jorge Castillo in Spanish. “He showed me a lot of his abilities that I didn’t know he had. That guy has tremendous strength, tremendous power. And he really surprised me a lot in everything we did.”
In this year’s Cactus League, Robert produced a .300/.386/.500 slash line, with four homers.
“If I’m able to carry on the work that I did during spring training, I’m going to have a good season,” Robert said. “Especially in that aspect of my vision of the whole plate. I know I can do it.”
Getz — who will have to determine if and when to pull the trigger on a Robert deal — lauded Robert’s efforts during the spring.
“Luis Robert is in an excellent spot,” Getz said. “The amount of three-ball counts that he had in spring training was by far the most he has had as a professional player. So that just speaks to his determination and focus to put together quality at-bats.”
It’s a bittersweet situation. The remaining vestige of the last good White Sox team remains the club’s most talented player. He’s in his age-27 season, often the apex of a hitter’s career. Yet if he reaches that apex, it’s only going to smooth his way out of town.
For the White Sox, all they can do is make sure Robert can stay focused on the field, while tuning out the trade chatter that isn’t going away.
“We’re going to support Luis,” Getz said. “I know that oftentimes he gets asked questions whether he’s going to be traded, but I’ve been really impressed with how he’s been able to remain focused on his craft. He’s very motivated to show the baseball world what he’s capable of doing.”
Dutch digital bank Bunq on Tuesday said it’s filed for broker-dealer registration in the U.S. as it looks to further expand across the Atlantic.
Bunq CEO Ali Niknam said the broker-dealer application will be an initial step toward securing a full banking license. He couldn’t offer a firm timeline for when Bunq will secure this authorization in the U.S. — but said he’s excited for its growth prospects in the country.
Obtaining a broker-dealer license will mean Bunq “can offer our users who have an international footprint — which is the user demography we’re aiming for — a great number of our services,” Niknam told CNBC. Bunq mainly caters for “digital nomads,” individuals who can live and work from anywhere remotely.
Bunq will be able to offer most of its services in the U.S. with the exception of a savings account after securing broker-dealer authorization, Niknam added.
Bunq, which touts itself as a bank for “digital nomads,” currently has a banking license in the European Union. It has applied for an Electronic Money Institution (EMI) in the U.K. Bunq previously had operations in Britain but forced to withdraw from the country in 2020 due to Brexit.
Bunq initially filed for a U.S. Federal bank charter in April 2023. However, it withdrew the application a year later, citing issues between its Dutch regulator and U.S. agencies. The company plans to resubmit its application for a full U.S. banking license later this year.
“This is different in continental Europe to the U.K. We had negative interest rates for long,” Niknam told CNBC. “So as we were growing, actually our cost base was also growing because we had to pay for all the deposits that people deposited a Bunq so I think we’re in a great position in 2025
Bunq is coming up against heaps of competition, especially in the U.S. market. America is already served by established consumer banking giants, including JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Wells Fargo and Citigroup. It’s also home to several major fintech brands, such as Chime and Robinhood.
Several French prisons were attacked overnight in response to government efforts to clamp down on drug trafficking in the country, senior officials said.
Unknown assailants fired automatic weapons at a prison in the southern city of Toulon, while vehicles were burned outside other facilities across the country and staff were threatened.
France’s national anti-terrorism prosecutor’s office said on Tuesday that it had taken charge of the investigation, while the country’s DGSI national security investigation will also be involved.
French media reported that the prisons targeted were in or near cities including Toulon, Aix-En-Provence, Marseille, and the communes of Valence and Nimes.
Prisons were also targeted in the commune of Villepinte and the suburb of Nanterre near Paris, according to reports.
It is not immediately clear whether the attacks were co-ordinated, or who carried them out.
Image: Damaged caused by an automatic weapon to the exterior of La Farlede Prison near Toulon. @SyndFoJustice
Image: Damaged caused by an automatic weapon to the exterior of La Farlede Prison near Toulon. @SyndFoJustice
France’s Justice Minister Gerald Darmanin, who has led efforts to toughen prison security and crack down on gangsters who run their empires from behind bars, said he would travel to Toulon.
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“Attempts have been made to intimidate staff in several prisons, ranging from burning vehicles to firing automatic weapons,” Mr Darmanin wrote on X.
“I am going to Toulon to support the officers concerned. The French Republic is facing up to the problem of drug trafficking and is taking measures that will massively disrupt the criminal networks.”
Meanwhile, the country’s Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau said he had instructed local prefects, alongside the police and gendarmerie, to immediately step up the protection of staff and prisons.
Image: Burnt cars in the car park of the prison in Villepinte.
Pic: @SyndFoJustice
A ‘white tsunami’ of cocaine
Years of record South American cocaine imports to Europe have supercharged local drug markets, sparking a wave of drug violence across the continent.
Gangs in France have been able to expand from traditional power bases in cities like Marseille into smaller regional towns unaccustomed to drug violence.
The rise in gang crime is thought to have led to increased support for the far-right National Rally party and have helped drag French politics rightward.
Mr Darmanin, a former interior minister, and Mr Retailleau have prioritised tackling drug trafficking.
Image: Bruno Retailleau, left, and Gerald Darmanin, right, have prioritised tackling drug trafficking. Pic: AP
In February, Mr Retailleau announced record cocaine seizures of 47 tonnes in the first 11 months of 2024 compared to 23 tonnes in all of 2023.
Mr Retailleau said France had been hit by a “white tsunami” that had rewritten the rules of the criminal landscape.
Meanwhile, Mr Darmanin has proposed a series of measures to tighten prison security, including isolating the country’s top 100 kingpins.
Lawmakers are also close to approving a sweeping new anti-drug trafficking law that would create a new national organised crime prosecutors’ office and give greater investigative power to police investigating drug gangs.
French authorities scored a win against drug crime in February, when they recaptured Mohamed Amra, a French fugitive known as “The Fly.”
His escape as he was being transported from prison to a court hearing resulted in the deaths of two prison guards and was seized upon by right-wing politicians as evidence that France had lost its grip on drug crime.